Linguistic Landscape of Pennsylvania

The linguistic landscape of Pennsylvania is incredibly diverse, including more than 20 different languages or language families. Apart from English, the population of Pennsylvania employs languages such as Spanish, Chinese, Dutch, and German, to name only a few. With today’s technology, understanding the linguistic landscape of Pennsylvania is easier and more interactive than ever. Below you can see what areas of Pennsylvania have the highest proportion of Chinese, Dutch, German, and Spanish speakers.
In Centre County, Chinese is the most commonly spoken language other than English. Approximately 1.8% of the population of Centre County speaks Chinese, or about 2,700 residents. Chinese is closely followed by Spanish, spoken by 1.5% of the population, or approximately 2,200 residents. Other notable languages spoken in Centre County include Dutch (including Pennsylvania Dutch and Afrikaans), reporting 0.9%, or approximately 1,300 speakers. Korean is spoken by 0.8% of the population, or around 1,200 speakers. Other languages represented in Centre County include, but are not limited to Russian, German, Arabic, French, Japanese, Hindi, Vietnamese, African (including Amharic, Ibo, Twi, Yoruba, Bantu, Swahili, and Somali languages), and Slavic languages.
In the borough of State College alone, there are over 1,000 speakers of Chinese, over 800 speakers of Spanish, and 700 speakers of Korean. In addition to the languages spoken in Centre County, State College is also home to speakers of Portuguese, Tagalog, and other Indic languages.
For more information about the linguistic landscape of Pennsylvania, please feel free to peruse the Statistical Atlas: https://statisticalatlas.com/state/Pennsylvania/Languages#data-map/county
https://www.census.gov/

Upcoming Events

Our outreach events are a wonderful time to connect with the surrounding community, families, and students at Penn State. We participate in many events throughout the year, always with games and demonstrations in tow. At family events, we have kid-friendly activities like face painting and language games. We hope to see you at our next event!

Bilingualism Matters at ExplorationU at Bald Eagle High School (left) and Central PA Arts Festival (right).

Join us for World Stories Alive, a series focused on stories and songs from eight different languages! Saturdays at 11am from January 20 to April 14 at the Schlow Library. Visit our website for more information!